Landon: Justice Series ― Erotica Paranormal Romance (9 page)

Allister tried to control his temper. He prided himself on his ability to control all aspects of his life, and here he was on the verge of not just losing it, but also his mind. This man knew things that not even his daughter might know. Like the stain on his tie. The fact that he’d killed his housekeeper and butler when they threatened to go to the state about him refusing them time off. And there was the fact that the man seemed to know just what he was doing every minute of his conversation with him.

“I’m going to hang up now, and when I do, I’m going to have this call traced.” The man laughed again. “You won’t think it’s so fucking funny when I come to your house and kill you and your entire family, now will you? Then I’m going to find my daughter and shoot her between the eyes for making it perfectly clear that she’s not only not to be trusted, but no longer a daughter to me. I will end her before I ever step foot in a prison, if I ever will.”

“Let me save you some trouble. My name is Steele Bennett, and I live three miles due east of the house that you’re staying in. Which, I would like to point out, is a major stepdown from the one you consider your main home. Would you like my phone number?” As it was being rattled off to him, Allister tried to think where he’d heard that name before. “And so you know, if you come here with any kind of malice, you will regret it for the rest of your very short life.”

The line went dead. The sound, the long hum of it, had him as shaken as the man’s final words to him. Carefully and slowly, he put the handset back in the cradle and sat down. Allister was as scared now as he’d ever been in all his long life.

~~~

Steele laid his cell phone down and waited. Billy was supposed to come right to him when the phone was hung up and leave Carlton behind in the hotel room to watch Allister. The two of them had been watching over the man since he’d figured out who he was to Dillon. Almost as if he’d summoned him, Billy appeared in the room with him.

“He’s powerfully pissed off.” Steele told him good. “Threw up several times, almost not making it to the commode too. Funniest thing I done ever did witness, and you know that I’ve seen a great deal. You suppose he might come here after all?”

“I hope so.” Steele looked over at the tiny cradle that his little girl was sleeping in that had been brought in here earlier this morning. Kari and Dillon were out shopping for things for the house. Vinnie had some people watching over them, as did he, but he knew that if anything came their way, Kari could tear the man apart. If it came to that. “Grandda, do you know if his wife is around? On my side or yours?”

“She died some time back. Right after she birthed up that girl of Landon’s. Broken heart I heard, but don’t know. I’ve got my feelers out for her, but you know that if they don’t want me to find them, then I can’t. Connie is looking too, just to be sure.” Steele had a feeling that she’d been broken rather than just broken hearted. Two of the nurses that had attended the birth of Dillon had said that Allister had been thoroughly pissed when Dillon had been born a girl and not a boy. And more so when he’d found out that there were never going to be any more children. “Steele, what do you think of that girl, Dillon? Heard tell she can find anything she puts her mind to.”

“I’m thinking of asking her to dinner tonight, her and Landon. They’ve been avoiding us all since she came to his house, and I’d like to get to know her. Kari loves her, and her somewhat jaded view of children. She told Kari that she’d had a nanny that had a baby, and that was how she’d learned about children. I guess her father never paid any attention to her or the nanny, and it was several years before anyone knew that there was a baby in the house.” Grandda said that he loved her ideas on child rearing. It was spot on with what his own wife had done with theirs. “Kari said that Dillon has a wealth of information about a great many things. She’s well read, she told Kari. I think it’s more than that.”

“I’ll look into it for you. Maybe I can find me some answers from that guy that you have in that safe house. That driver of Allister’s, he seemed pretty talkative to that guy you have watching him.” Steele told him to look into it for him. “You should also know that Landon is having a conversation with his tormentors. Not sure what he’s going to do with them, but that’s what I heard.”

“He told me that he’s going to have me banish them. There is justifiable cause. They’ve done nothing to help others, and they’ve been a nuisance since the day they were killed. I told him I’d do it. He has only to say the word.” His grandda told him that was a good idea. “Thanks for helping me.”

“Anytime, you know that. I’m always up for some fun.” Grandda laughed. “I’m thinking I need to go and have me some fun with Connie for a bit. That woman can surely make me laugh.”

After Grandda left, Steele sat there for several minutes. He was thinking of the boys that Landon had always had with him but never mentioned. Whatever they had been to him, Steele figured they were his problem. At the time, Steele had had enough of his own issues he was dealing with. Now he realized he should have stepped in, at least asked him about them.

Steele thought of the other issue he was having taken care of. Vinnie’s father was still around. Not much of him was left; the man had not taken care of himself since he’d been killed, and now he was nothing much more than a wad of chewed up gum that would stick to your shoe. Steele was going to go out later and deal with him as well. It was time for him to move on, to wherever that might be.

“Are you babysitting all by yourself today?” Steele looked up at his sister and smiled. To have her back in his life, even like this, was the next best thing to having her there in person. “I just saw Kari and Dillon. They’re safe and having a good time. I think Vinnie and Addie are going to meet up with them later.”

“Landon was telling me last night that they’re out of even the smallest of things. He hired a cook today on the recommendation of Izzy. Did you know that she has a sister?” Aster said that she did as she peered into the cradle that was softly moving back and forth. “Oh, I have something for you. Something I think you’ll love.”

“Do you?” She didn’t turn around to see him, so when he came up behind her, she turned and stepped back. “Steele, what are you doing? You hate it when we get this close.”

“Not you I don’t. But take me.” She frowned at him. “Take my body and pick up your niece. You know you want to hold her. And I want you to.”

“No, that’s not...you said that it’s dangerous to do that with her. It would confuse her.” Steele touched his fingers out to his sister’s cheek and wished, as he had so many times, that he could hold her once more. “Back up and let me around you. I don’t want to go through you, but I will.”

“Take me, Aster, and hold your namesake. She is awake and will be crying soon, and you won’t want to hold her then.” Her head was shaking, but he could tell she really wanted it. “Either take me or I do you. And you know that you won’t have as much control if I do. Hold your baby niece. Tell her that you love her and hold her in your arms.”

She moved into him. It was soft and inviting, and Steele felt his own eyes fill with tears. Her happiness hit him first, then her sadness. Not at holding his child, but that she had to come to him for this moment. Her love for all of them was so much. Steele could feel his sister’s love for him and Kari, as well as the baby. He knew that she was saddened by how much she was missing, and how much more she would as well. But she could see them, she told herself, which was more than most other ghosts could do.

Steele hoped that Aster could feel his love for her as well. How much he missed her, needed her in his life even still. His heart was still heavy when he thought of the things he’d said to her the day she’d been killed, and he knew that for as long as he lived, he would cherish her as much as he did that day. As she reached into the crib to pick the baby up, he knew the moment she touched the baby that his daughter knew there was a difference in the two of them. And her smile was enough to make Steele feel like he could take on the world and come up a winner.

“Oh Steele, she’s so pretty. Look at those eyes. Just like Mom’s.” He could speak to Aster this way, but was so overwhelmed with emotion right now that all he could do was feel. Little Aster was staring up into the face that she knew, but she seemed to know that it was someone special holding her. Steele figured that his daughter was a great deal like he and his sister were. Maybe even more.

“Kari said that she’s got a lot of her panther in her. Not a full blood of course, but a great deal.” Aster said that she’d talked to Kari too, as well as the baby. “You need to come to her more often. I think she can see you.”

“Of course she can. And grandmother too. Grandad has taken to telling her stories at night when she wakes up.” Steele knew this. He’d heard him telling her the most farfetched stories over the baby monitor that he’d had set up in her room. He also knew that Kari was sleeping better now too, knowing that the baby was being watched over by so many people who loved her. “She’s like us, did you know that?”

“I thought she might be. I know that as a child she can see and talk to any of you guys, but she seems to be able to summon anyone she wants as well. Like Grandda when she wants him close at hand, as well as Garth. He loves coming here to see her.”

Garth was a young boy that had been murdered by the same people who had tried to kill Mitch when he’d been a kid. Garth, a ghost that had been around for a while, had known what the Bruces were up to, and had stepped in and saved him and another boy. Garth had been buried in the back yard with several other young boys, without so much as a marker to say he’d been killed. Steele had had him brought here when his body had been exhumed, and his marker had been placed just last week. He had been helping Mitch with some of the projects he had going. It had worked out well for all of them except the Bruces, who were set to go on trial for murder and all sorts of other things in three months.

When Aster said that she was ready, he knew that as soon as she left his body, he was going to feel slightly drained. And as Little Aster was put in her crib, his sister moved out of his body and stood nearby as he held onto the closest chair. When he was stronger, he turned and looked at her.

“Thank you so much.” He nodded and wiped at the tears streaming down his face. He thought perhaps that his love for her had doubled in the last few minutes. “No one could ask for a better brother. And you’re going to be such a wonderful dad to her. I’m going to make sure you are, by the way.”

“I expect no less of you.” She nodded and looked around before standing close enough that he could have touched her if he could. “Aster, I’m so sorry every day of my life for saying those things to you. If I could have taken them back, you know that I would.”

“I know that. And I know that you didn’t mean anything. You were stressed. We both were. And I promise you, Steele, I never once thought of it again after I left the house. I was free for the morning and doing what I loved. Being me.” He nodded, still brokenhearted for her. “I love you so much, big brother.”

“And I love you just as much, little sister.” They stood there for several seconds, each of them, he was sure, lost in their own thoughts. When she lifted her head to look up at him, he could see her happiness as if she were really standing in front of him. “Come to see us more, all right? I need you around more.”

“I will. But for now, I have to go.” He nodded and watched her fade just a little. “Tell Dillon that she’s going to be just fine with us. I think she worries that Landon is going to put her to the curb soon.”

“He loves her.” Aster nodded and faded a little more. “I love you. Very much.”

“And I you.” Then she was gone. Steele went to the crib where his daughter was sleeping, scooped her up into his arms, and sat in the newly purchased rocker and cried hard as he held her to his heart.

Chapter 8

“So how does this work?” Dillon watched the couple in the other room who were telling another officer what had happened to their only child. It was all lies, she’d been told, and they just needed her to prove it. The man behind her, however, was less than helpful, and getting on her nerves. “You just go in there and tell them that you’ve located their child and that you want them to come clean with his murder? I don’t see that working. And the courts will throw it out in a hot minute. Tell me again why the chief thinks you can do a better job than we have so far?”

“It would help me if you would just let me think.” Really, she was terrified of being here. Landon had asked her to help out the police with this case, and she wasn’t sure how she could help. But Teddy, she’d been told, had asked for her. She could do no less than go in there and do her best. If the man complaining all the time would just shut the fuck up. “Just be quiet and let me think.”

He snickered a little and leaned back against the wall behind him, as if he were humoring her. She supposed he was in a way. But she knew things that he didn’t. Like the little boy that they claimed was kidnapped was actually dead. By their hand. The reason she’d been brought in, Landon told her, was that they couldn’t locate the body. But he thought she could.

Landon and the rest of the team had been called out late yesterday afternoon. She and the other women of the family, including, she’d been told, Connie and Aster, had ended up at the mall at the kitchen store. She’d not realized that there were so many things you might need in a house as big as the one that she lived in with Landon, but the new cook, Alice, had given her a list of things to get. And she told her that if she wanted to have a hot meal in the house, that things were going to need to be brought up to this century. The stove alone was nearly a hundred years old. Then the call came in from Landon.

“We have a problem that I think you can help us with.” She said she’d try. Then after he explained what had happened, she told him she wasn’t sure about that. “I am. You can find people, right? With the right things that belonged to them?”

“Yes. I can find anything that has some sort of attachment to the person. But it has to be theirs, not something that the family has picked up at the store because they think that’ll work.” He asked her what she meant. “A few years ago this family lost their child. And they didn’t have his favorite toy with them. I think it was with the child when they...never mind. They thought if they got the same toy and loved on it all the way to the offices, then I’d be able to just use that. Sometimes people think it’ll throw me off, too. See if I’m lying about what I can do.”

“Well, that’s...I guess I can understand people not believing what you can do. But the other? How the hell did they think that would even work if the kid had never touched it?” She told him she had no idea. “People are just plain weird. Me included. But Teddy thinks there’s more here than they’re saying. Even the cops are sort of stumped on this. Can you help him out?”

So now here she was, in a large police station with hundreds of people milling around the place while she tried her best to get her courage up. She was afraid to find the child, and more than that, she was almost sick with knowing that the people she was going to have to go and talk to had done it to him.

“I’m ready.” The officer stood up but still acted like this was all a game. Going into the room with the people, she introduced herself as Kerrie and nothing more. “I’ve been asked by the police to come in and see if I could help out. I’m a medium. Do you know what that is?”

The man looked at his wife and smiled. It was a smile she’d seen before. It said, “Yeah, right, she’s here to help them.” Not that it mattered what he thought of her. Right now she was doing the right thing when he had not.

“You want us to tell you what happened again, and then you’re gonna touch us and see that we’re telling you the truth. All right then. So long as it brings us back our little boy, we can play all the parlor games they need before they really start to look for him.”

She told him that it didn’t work that way. “I need to touch something that belonged to him. Not to the family, but to him. Like a blankie if he has one. Or a favorite toy. Even a bottle will do.”

He asked her if a diaper would do. “I got a nice ripe one in the car that might help you.” He stood up then, his body hard with anger. “You think you can just come in here and make demands on us when our child is out there suffering at the hands of some kidnapper? We don’t even have his blankie to keep us comforted, and you’re asking for a diaper.”

“I never asked you for a diaper. I told you something that belonged to him. You’re the moron that thought a shitty diaper would help in this in any way. Now shut up and get me what I asked for.” The man stared at her and the woman cried. The woman, Teddy had told her on the way over here, was the stumbling block for whatever had happened. She had no idea what that meant, but hoped she was wrong about the child’s demise.

Dillon made it a point not to know the names of the people she was working with. Or for. She wanted to have a clear picture of whoever she was looking for and what they might have been to the people looking. Same with items she’d been asked to find. Just that a watch was missing, or a wallet. Nothing more, just the basics. Now she wanted to hit the man in front of her. But the mother pulled out a worn stuffed bunny from her pocket.

“It’s his. It’s J—” Dillon told her no names. “He slept with it. It helped him to sleep. I found it in the car when he was...when those people took him from us.”

Nodding, Dillon asked her to put it on the table. As she was taking deep breaths, the man said he wanted her out of there. When he reached for the little toy, the cop stopped him.

Picking it up in her hands, she knew several things about the dolly. First of all, this particular toy had belonged to two other children before the missing little boy. A little girl had loved it, as had a child with a handicap. She wasn’t sure what his handicap was until she concentrated harder on him.

It was their son. As she held the bunny tighter, she closed her mind to the conversation that was going on around her. The woman was crying softly, but the man was getting louder by the minute. When she heard him cursing, Dillon started speaking. She figured that if he knew what she had found, he’d shut the fuck up.

“Your daughter was born with a birth defect. It wasn’t caught until she was nearly ten years old. But that didn’t stop you from locking her in the shed at the back of your property and letting her starve to death. Her breathing was making it hard for your husband to hear his programs, so that had to be taken care of. This bunny was all you had left of her.” If the people spoke, Dillon was no longer listening to them. It was the person that had loved the bunny that was. “The second child that you put in the shed was younger. He too was born with a birth defect, but not as bad as his sister’s. You actually thought about keeping him around for more welfare money because it was hardly noticeable, but in the end, the father hated that Mommy had given birth to a retard. Then the third baby came along. Trevor was born with congenital heart disease, just as the others had been. You killed him a little differently in that you put him in the bottom of the well when he was only three months old. The only reason that you’re claiming that this child was taken is that you had him in a hospital, where the other two had been birthed at home. The men, as you call the welfare agents, were going to wonder where he was when his next doctor’s appointment came up and he wasn’t around.” The pain in her head brought her out of the memories. Then blackness took her under.

When she opened her eyes, she was lying on the floor and her body was covered by someone’s jacket. She’d been hit, she knew that much, but why or how was a mystery. When Landon picked her up, holding her so that she could no longer see the table, Dillon asked him if she’d helped.

“We didn’t know about the other children until now.” She nodded. “How did you know that much? I mean, the children…how did they know what was wrong with them?”

“They didn’t. The mother did, and she’s been holding onto the bunny longer than the children had. Her memories were on it…little of the children, as a matter of fact.” Landon nodded and held her to him. “What happens now, Landon? Will the parents be brought to justice?”

“The mother confessed while you were out. The father, he tried to shut her up but ended up being cuffed and taken away before she finished. She told them everything, including where the other two bodies were buried. She’d done it for them, wrapped them up and buried them while her husband slept.”

“What else?” He frowned at her. “There is a reason that you’re keeping me like this. What is it?”

“She’s dead.” Dillon asked him who. “The mother. When the police were trying to talk to her, one of them got too close, I guess. She pulled a gun free of one of their holsters and shot herself in the head.”

“Have you been talking to her?” He told her that Steele was, as he was stronger. “Tell her that the children loved her. All they thought about was...they knew their father hated them, the little girl especially. But they loved her. Very much.”

“I’m not sure that she needs to hear that right now. I think she’s telling him that she had been living with the guilt of this for some time. Since...well, the oldest. I don’t understand some people. Why not just give them up for adoption?” She told him what she knew as he told her that he’d only just arrived when she’d been hurt. “So they didn’t let the welfare office know that she was dead. And the other child, how did they account for him?”

“They didn’t. He was never born, so far as anyone knew.” Landon led her out of the small room and out into the sunshine. She paused there, turning her face to feel the heat of it on her face. “Landon, I love you. Very much.”

“I love you very much too. Will you marry me?” Dillon turned to him. “I had this really awesome speech all made up in my head. Things I was going to say to you. Share with you. But seeing you here, with your face bright with the last rays of the day and the shadows of the night coming on us, all I can think about is having you as my wife and growing old with you.”

“Yes. Yes, I’ll marry you. But I have one favor to ask of you.” He nodded and came toward her. “I want to adopt children, as well as have them. I want to give some child or children chances that they seldom get in this world.”

“I love that idea. And yes, we can do that. I have everything arranged at the courthouse for us to be wed in the morning. I don’t want to wait around until something goes wrong again.” She laughed at him. “A man has to do what he can when his future wife is right here and willing.”

~~~

Allister wasn’t having any luck. Or fun. There seemed to be a trip-up at every turn. And no one, not a single person around him, knew his daughter. Yet he knew she was here. Strolling down the street thinking about how poorly he was sleeping, he stopped when he saw the shop in the newspaper article. Old Things.

Personally, Allister hated old things. Antiques were not his thing, and he avoided things that even looked like they might have been from another era. Distress made him think poorly, and he wanted no part of that. But he had to admit, whoever was in charge of their display window had a knack for it. It was appealing, yet much understated. He thought he’d see about hiring them for one of his store fronts.

“Excuse me.” The woman behind him was pushing a pram. He’d bet his last nickel that she’d gotten it in this place, because it looked as old as the building it had more than likely come from. Opening the door for her was a mistake…he was pushed inside just in front of her and ended up standing in the biggest warehouse of old shit he’d ever seen in his life.

“Mr. Malone.” He put out his hand before he could think that the man standing next to him shouldn’t know his name. As the man took it in a hard, unforgiving grip, Allister thought of the man he’d spoken to yesterday. “Welcome. I see you’re getting around all right.”

“Who are you?” He hated the way his voice screeched. The way his palm felt sweaty and hot when the man finally let him go. And worst of all, he hated not being on top of things. He liked to be the one with all the answers.

“Landon. We were told you might be around today. I do hope you go back to your main home soon. We’ve no use for you here.” Allister felt his temper rise, and he actually put his hand to his side where he knew he had a gun. But the man laughed at him. “That’s no longer there. I don’t want it to go off and hurt someone that might be in your way. Your gun will be returned to you when you get back to your plane. If you plan to see things my way, that is.”

“You stole my gun?” The man only laughed at him, and Allister felt the hair on his arms dance. “Give that back to me right now.”

“I’m afraid that would be breaking the rules, don’t you think? Not to mention felons aren’t supposed to own guns. That ten years you spent in prison should have taught you at least that much.” Allister took a step back, then another, until he bumped into someone behind him. “Allister, I’d like for you to meet my good friend, Steele Bennett. But then, I think you’ve spoken to each other.”

Allister turned and looked at the man. If anyone had been named for their appearance, this man was it. He was hard looking, ruthlessly so. The word “unforgiving” came to mind, as did a few others. If he were to be doing business with this man, Allister knew that he’d not live long if he crossed him.